Sunday, October 31, 2010

I've got one last Halloween-inspired manicure for y'all today, and that is Ulta's For Bitten. This shade was launched in a mini collection last year and inspired a huuge collecting frenzy, so imagine my surprise when I walked into Ulta and found a full-size bottle of this beauty!

I had my trepidations about this one, to be honest. The polish has this wonderful duochrome shimmer in its bottle--green to gold to a deep warm purple--that my instinct told me wouldn't transfer at all on the nail.

Wrong. Gloriously wrong. Observe:

(Gah, I know it's blurry.)

Here is the polish giving off a deep purple glimmer. It occasionally flares red at an angle like this when facing the light.

Here, you can see its transition to gold.

This is really, really pretty and really, really effortless. Two coats, no complaints on application. It dries quickly and lasts for quite a while--I think I wore this for three days. The shimmer seems subtle from the pictures that I'm showing you, but I've also received an unbelievable amount of compliments on this--no regular black creme to the human eye, this one. It glares colors.

And look at that bottle!

This is my favorite black creme with colored shimmer to date. I like this a tad bit better than I like voodoo, but they evoke different moods.

I'm still feeling the kick for these irregular shimmer particles that Orly FX and Zoya Sparkles ran away with. I know other people are getting really tired of them, but man! Look at what these babies can do! They give you glitter-like sparkle, foil-like texture, and are very easy to remove. More please, and in more colors than, say, Space Cadet, which has two dupes out already. (I love Space Cadet, but seriously?) Or Zombie Zest/It's Not Rocket Science. Or Mr. Wrong/Purple Gala. Or Galaxy Girl/Formidable!.

Still, in the meantime, I'm gonna be overdosing on cremes in November since I'm a little oversaturated on the other finishes this month. Besides, sparkle season (Christmas!!! New Year's!!!) is coming up and I need to be ready for that, too. Who's with me?

Also, who'd appreciate a little RBL spam the night before the madness happens?

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Yeah, I'm workin' through the Halloween-inspired swatches. Can you tell?

Anyway, Funky Fingers' Voodoo is a black creme with little irregular flakes of gold/olive green. This is two coats. No application problems except for slight cuticle drag on the second coat--be careful not to push the polish around.

In real life this polish looks almost.... wooden. Or like stones. The gold sparkle shows up like texture in the creme. One would think that it'd look like stars or something--but organic is definitely the idea that comes to mind. The next picture might showcase that pretty well:

I wouldn't even say that it looks true black from far off. The gold warms the color to a deep muddy brown, brings it highlights, flares and flashes in sunlight. I liked it a lot. Moody, brooding, dark, earthy... Voodoo is practical magic at its best.

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

And so we're going to start off with a wonderful Halloween-y bang with Hard Candy Mischief, a limited edition HC color that's available right now.

It's... well, it's lovely. I know that my pictures make it look like a bumpy, gritty mess, but it truly is. Observe:

There's a way that this polish looks like autumn leaves in rain water that I can't help but enjoy. I think--and I have a lot of these--but this is one of my more autumnal polishes, let alone a polish very appropriate for Halloween.

Mischief is an orange glitter held in--um--slime green jelly. No joke. In the bottle it looks kind of gross. On the nail, though, the green builds easily and adds a bit of contrast and depth to the nail. You almost think it looks black, but it isn't. You'd almost hope it's brown... but it isn't.

From far off it looks like very speckled burnt orange polish... like a glitter painted over black. It lends quite a bit of texture to the look.

(Do you see how it just flares and glows when the camera's not focused on it? Mmm. Like magic.)

I wish I had some good pictures of this look in the sun, but it's very foggy and cloudy where I am right now. This is the best I could do, and at the least it's true to life.

So yes! That is Hard Candy Mischief, complete in three coats (with slight cuticle drag on the second). Loverly polish. I will probably be wearing her again this week.

I'll also be keeping this week as Halloween-themed as possible (without freaking out my new coworkers, I hope)! Stay tuned!

Saturday, October 16, 2010

Sorry I've been MIA for a while now, and I'm even more sorry that things keep happening this way. This is because this is a tumultuous time for me: I've been employed since last Monday and had to travel down to another city in order to make it to work. Not a lot of free time right now, or even free time during daylight hours where I could swatch or something!

I'm not sure how long this absence will last--hopefully, it'll go over very soon and I'll find a place to stay and things will smooth over very quickly--but for now, we'll see! Thanks for being so patient with me!

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

I do say this quite often, but this time it is imperative: click on the images to see the polish better. My pictures are generally very large. That will help.

I can't decide whether or not I like Galaxy Girl or Space Cadet better. They're so different, and both so awesome! Space Cadet reminds me of the shift of color in autumn leaves and the amount of colors that it shifts into is... just great. Galaxy Girl goes on the color of dried blood and then picks up this teal to magenta shimmer that's so strange and moody and complex. I mean, look below:

(Bottle pictures here show a lot of the color shift as well.) You know what, I'm just going to stop talking. Here. It's pretty. It's two coats for opacity. I adore this. Get it when you can. It's worth it. CVS is cheaper than e-tailers. It's also worth the quest.

Monday, October 4, 2010

Orly's fall collection--that is, the Cosmix Fx--was a giant hit on the nail board even before the swatches came out. It sounded so promising, so complex, that we just couldn't wait for them to come out. Now that they are pretty much out for the general public... they've lived up (mostly) to their hype. These are gorgeous, and Space Cadet is my clear winner.

Space Cadet is a polish whose finish is very similar to, say, Hard Candy's Mr. Wrong: a colored sheer finish with a ridiculous amount of irregularly-shaped flakes/glitter pieces. The difference is that Space Cadet has a teal base and is filled with glitter that flashes alternately green, gold, rose, deep violet, etc.--depending on the light. I've tried to take pictures that showcase this, but pictures do it no justice. This polish is gorgeous.

This is three coats of Space Cadet--I believe that layering this polish over another color will preserve it a little, although I can't say for certain. (Check out that bit of blue peeking through the polish color. Gah.)

So I took a video:

Wow. The quality is a little bad, but it is my camera video, so... I hope you can forgive me for that! > <

Friday, October 1, 2010

My pictures have changed in quality, haven't they? I've taken to taking pictures in a very well-lit indoor room because I feel as though the color takes center stage and is also more color-accurate than when I take them in washed-out outdoor pictures. :D What do you guys think?

Anyway, this is China Glaze Stroll--a polish that I found in a dusty pile at one of my favorite nail supply stores in my college town. This is also one of those colors that I've worn for a while now--it showed up in my review for LA Colors' Addict--but I've never swatched and reviewed on its own.

Stroll is a deep, warm red jelly with interspersed irregular gold glitter. It takes three coats for full opacity and is a wonderful, glowy autumnal color. The polish dries to a smooth finish despite the glitter and is also relatively easy to remove in comparison to most glitter standards.

But see, here's the thing: I like this color, and I think it's deep and sexy, but I can't help but be disappointed with the glitter thing. When a polish is described with gold glitter, I want to see gold. I don't in Stroll--not on the nail or in the bottle. Once I start removing the polish I can see its coloring but mostly the glitter sinks too much, giving the polish a textured, slightly pinky color that catches and glows in the light. But compare that to LA Girls' Addict, whose coloring is admittedly a lot less pigmented but when close up looks like standing under a tree with red and gold leaves. I prefer Addict by far...

But I've worn Stroll more often.

I've come to the conclusion that the real reason as to why I've done so is personal--the color matches exactly with the color of my glasses, semi-translucence and all. Sigh. Sometimes, vanity knows no bounds, huh?